Community News

Morgan County commissioners OK plan for trash to go to energy plant

ByJENNI GRUBBS Times Staff Writer

Posted:
05/01/2013 10:31:47 AM MDT

Updated:
05/03/2013 09:09:38 AM MDT

The Board of Morgan County Commissioners on Tuesday approved an agreement with Energy Recovery Partners to provide trash from the Morgan County Landfill to the consortium behind the proposed waste-to-energy plant in Fort Morgan for the next 20 years.

Cassandra Wilson, the executive director of Morgan County Economic Development Corp., told the commissioners that this agreement was necessary for the waste-to-energy project to move forward.

The county already had a memorandum of understanding in place with Creative Energy Solutions, which is one of the companies in the consortium seeking to build the plant.

"This project is a consortium of companies that have a facility they can build" that turns waste into energy, Commissioner Jim Zwetzig explained. "The technology is there."

This agreement with ERP would ensure that the project would have the waste it needed to create energy.

"It obligates our trash to them for 20 years," Commissioner Laura Teague said of the agreement, which sunsets in 2033. "Logan and Washington counties are entering into similar agreements."

The commissioners had planned to take action on a second issue related to this project -- an intergovernmental agreement between the three counties, but Administrative Services Manager Susan Bailey explained that the contract documents for this were not yet ready.

The commissioners tabled action on this issue.

"We will take it up again in a week or so," Teague said.

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Commissioner Jim Zwetzig explained that this did not mean the project was stalled.

"The project is moving along as far as we know," he said.

The current issue is the power purchase agreement that is being hashed out between CES and the Municipal Energy Agency of Nebraska, which provides power to the city of Fort Morgan.

The hope is that CES will be able to sell the energy it produces to MEAN, and then have that power be resold to Fort Morgan.

"Whenever they're able to get that (power purchase agreement), they will start construction," Zwetzig said.

Zwetzig also noted that CES has the funding in place to build the plant, so the county would not have risk from that.

He said that once the plant was in place, the use of the trash from the three counties would provide "an extension of our landfill capabilities and stabilization of our tipping rates" for contributing waste to the landfills.

Concerns about running out of room in the Morgan County Landfill was something that the commissioners previously had discussed, and it's a concern that the other counties also had been facing.

"It won't use all the trash" in the landfills, "but it will use the worst of it," Zwetzig said. "We couldn't have just had a meeting with the commissioners and came up with a better way to deal with the landfills."

The lack of financial risk, the opportunity to provide longevity to the landfills and the chance to bring a renewable energy source to the area "are what the three counties like" about the proposed waste-to-energy plant, Zwetzig said, adding that the city of Fort Morgan also liked those things, as well as the possibility of bringing jobs to the area.

"It's at no risk to us," he said. "Nothing's been asked from us but our trash so they can make low-cost electricity."

"It's just a big regional project," he said. "And then it's just above and beyond."

He said he was impressed with what the project could do for the area.

"I like to think that it will put our region on the map," he said, contemplating the possibility of green energy tourism because of it. "As far as green energy goes, it's better than wind or solar."

Zwetzig said he was excited about this project and was glad that it had come to this area.

"I think we're pretty forward-thinking if we get this going," he said.

He said the big thing now was CES working out the power purchase agreement with MEAN.

"MEAN is the only link in the chain that hasn't been closed," he said.

One concern about participating in the project that had been brought up by MEAN to the Fort Morgan City Council was the lack of other such facilities already operating.

"There's got to be a first guy to do everything," Zwetzig pointed out. "I think the MEAN Board of Directors will see it as something positive. But I look at that as something out of our hands. We're pro because we would like to see it happen for the county."

Teague called this a "really good regional project," since it involves the three counties, offers a means for reusing waste, and has the potential to bring economic development to the area.

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